Economy Dominates At Environmental Summit

The Connecticut League of Conservation Voters brought together nearly 200 environmental advocates and several lawmakers today to discuss their legislative agenda for next year. As WNPR’s Nancy Cohen reports the recession and the state’s $3.5 billion budget deficit influenced much of the discussion.

Republican Senator John McKinney told the crowd there are so many challenges before the state it’s not the time to fight purely ideological battles.

"We need to sit down, try to reach compromise and pass something that will improve our environmental protection even though it’s not going to go as far as people in this room may want."

Senate President Don Williams, a Democrat said  the energy bill passed by the General Assembly last year, but vetoed by Governor Rell would have made a bigger investment in conservation and efficiency –something he said would drive down business costs—and pollution

"I predict ... that we will pass a comprehensive energy bill, building on some of the good steps weve taken in the past ... with an emphasis on efficiency and bringing down rates and bringing down greenhouse gasses and that we’ll have a Governor that signs that bill."

Governor-elect Dan Malloy said he would have signed last years bill, but he called some of it “imperfect.”

"When it comes to enrgey I known that the philosophy is to cram everything into a five pound bag, throw it to the legislature at the  last minute in hopes of having  as little discussion as possible and getting a vote on it. That may have made political sense in the way that state government was run over the last number of years. I would rather see us take on some of these issues in smaller bites."

Malloy did not specify what parts of last year’s bill he does not support. He said his budget would involve shared sacrifice, but the environment would not take a back seat.

For WNPR, I’m Nancy Cohen.